Is Auto Shop Software Necessary?

posted on October 31, 2015

Do you need auto shop management software to run your car repair shop? Well I suppose the honest answer is maybe. It is NO if you don’t mind spending hours of your mechanic’s time double checking VIN #’s that they scribbled down wrong, making multiple phone calls to parts shops checking parts prices and hoping people are filling in time cards correctly. It is YES if you want efficiency, proper written RO’s, accurate business reports, accountability and higher profits.

Time Management The old saying is “a penny saved is a penny earned”. Well the same applies to time, every minute you can save by using a web based Auto Repair Shop Management Software is a minute you can use to complete more repairs and earn more income.

Every journey back to the car to double check that VIN #, or every time you make an extra phone call to find the part you need, getting put on hold, looking up customer RO history,if those activities are wasting your time, they are costing you money.

When we repair a vehicle, we are charging for parts and for time. The more efficiently you manage your technicians time the more profitable your business will be. This is exactly why Profitboost has a time clock that is easy to use and reports available showing you exactly how much time your technicians are using on each job.

You can use this data to review your tech efficiency and make sure that you are paying them fairly for the work they are doing

Parts ManagementPractically every repair order you make will have parts added to it. You spend tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars every year at parts stores. Your service writer spends hours each week on the phone checking prices and availability. You add a parts markup that you consider fair and that the market will bear.

It is all rather unorganized and is not always a good use of time. As a repair shop owner you need to be maximizing your return on investment, whether that is the investment in wages for your service writer and technicians or the money you put into parts.

Parts Pricing has often seemed to be really haphazard in the transmission repair shop business (and general repair shops are no better). One service writer adds 125% and sells the job on price while your other service writer always puts 150% and sells on the skill of your technicians.

Ideally they should both add the same markup to the same parts and sell the job on anything BUT price.

Your Automotive Shop Management Software should help you control your parts markup and parts pricing by creating a pricing matrix (Profitboost does this) that consistently makes you the same level of profit on each part you sell.

Connecting to parts stores online by using WHI, Worldpac or Epicor will save you many, many hours on the phone. Rather than calling your 3 favorite parts suppliers you can check the prices and availability online, it saves time and as we mentioned earlier time is what we are all selling.

Easy To Use SoftwareHaving Repair Order Writing software that is easy to use as well as being able to keep your company data secure is vital. Your data is possibly your largest business asset.

No one wants to spend all day (or a few days) learning how to create a Repair Order, it is not a good use of your time, so we made the system as simple as possible – Watch this Videoshowing just how easy it is to create a RO with Profitboost using PIFPro.

Auto UpdatingIf you have used repair shop software before, local to your PC’s hard drive, you are familiar with waiting for a CD to be delivered with the latest updates (and hoped they worked on your computer) then you will appreciate that we keep everything online on multiple servers, and backed up hourly, daily, weekly, monthly. By keeping everything in the Cloud we can update your software outside of working hours so all you need to do is concentrate on running your business, not stressing with whether the update CD is on its way or if it will load correctly. Cloud software wasn’t even heard of in the 90’s, now it is well known and more desirable than desktop software loaded on a local hard drive that will crash someday.

Secure Data The feeling when your desktop PC crashes and takes all your customer information with it is not one that anyone wants to experience, which is why Profit Boost stores everything in the cloud. By backing up your business imperative data across multiple secure servers you do not have to worry about anything. Honestly, how often does your data get backed up ?

So when you ask “Do I need Auto repair shop management software” what you are really are asking is “Do I want my business to be more efficient and more profitable?” and of course the answer is YES. Well at least we hope you would answer, Yes I do!

About PifProOur management software was designed by repair shop owners with over 40 years experience in running their own shops just like yours. PLUS, 10 years of input from hundreds of shop owners. They knew how frustrating it was when someone accidentally put down a 0 when it should have been an o, and how much time could be saved by using software instead of bits of paper.